Christian Aid Society Prepares Mother’s Day Meals for 3,300 Families in Taiwan

On the eve of Mother’s Day, the Christian Aid Society joined forces to prepare a “Mother’s Kitchen” for 3,300 families at the 1919 Food Bank. The society also planned to provide warm meals to areas where they were needed, so that struggling families could feel support from the wider community. In cooperation with “Taiwan Raya,” the society is also working to provide pre-coloured dressing kits for all 4,078 students at 1919, so children can send messages of thanks to their mothers with their own hands.

The source notes that many mothers from vulnerable families remain under severe stress after the festival. It reports that import inflation has risen again since March of this year, as a result of changes in the international situation and higher energy prices.

Price increases affect households differently. For many households, the source says, higher prices may mean eating less often. For families in vulnerable situations, each increase may directly reduce meals to the most basic level of three a day. According to the Relief Association’s 1919 Food Bank Outcome Report, 5,917 families receive an average monthly income of $25,937 and spend $26,199.

The pressure is most visible in single-parent families, where one parent often carries the household alone. The source describes Tinghua, 47, a new resident of Taiwan who is married and worked in a market. Thirteen years ago, her husband died of cancer, and the family’s income became hers alone. After his death, she obtained a Vietnamese language teaching license and worked as a writer at a rural office and as a translator at a police station. At the end of 2022, she suffered stomach trouble and bleeding, contracted COVID-19, and was hospitalized for more than a month. Her work stopped, and her income fell to nothing.

Tinghua met with Master Huang of the 1919 service centre and, with help from a priest at the Fuxung 1919 Service Center (Fukuyan Church), applied for emergency aid and food packs. She said she had always been self-reliant but was grateful for help during illness, and that the food packages were very useful to her. She has since moved from receiving help to helping others, assisting with administrative and financial duties at the church and with food packages for new families from Vietnam. “Helping others” in this case means she now gives practical support to newcomers, a picture of hospitality (Matthew 25:35).

Su-lan, a single mother in the village of Shinani, is raising six children after a violent divorce. The source says her ex-husband’s alimony is unreliable, and that the family often depends on low-income support and sometimes has only three meals. Her second child needed treatment for a liver tumor, requiring Su-lan to travel north and south alone for care. With limited funds, she could not pay for after-school care for the children. Friends introduced the family to “Sunyang 1919,” known as the Old Men’s Church, which the source says changed the family’s situation. Her eldest daughter has now served in the army, her second daughter has gone to college, and the other four sons continue to attend classes. Speaking about Mother’s Day, Su-lan said, “I only want the children to come to the church together, and none less.”

From the Mother’s Day period until May 31, the public can contribute to the “Your table beauty is the backbone of his tender” campaign. Donations support a “JIA” cooker and a Mother’s Day card and decoration.

Source: Read the original report (translated from Mandarin Chinese)